Satan Invented the Chair - PinePHresh and friend (we originally wrote a 1980s power ballad about a rock star who was trying to convince people that he wasn't a pedophile, but we didn't want to record it when my friend's parents were around. this is what we came up with on short notice instead)

Last edited by PinePHresh on Tue Jun 25, 2013 7:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

it might be friday/sat before I can submit some reviews. since i'm out of town I'm on a laptop that sometimes allows me to listen to shit sometimes not, and when I can it's terrible sounding. SO I don't want to shit on someone's mix unfairly.

Guitartheist - turn your compressor down some. That's why the entire song gets quieter when the snare hits in the beginning. Fiddle with those levels a bit. Also, I'd really like to hear this with better sounding stringed instruments. What program did you use? Your playing is nice and tight, and the vocals good and on key. All in all, everything fits in nicely to a well balanced song. Your clean vocals remind me of someone, can't place the name. Nice song, probably my fav of the bunch.

infinitenexus - I was going for a sort of stoner/doom feel on this one. I'm happy with the music, although I know it needs better mixing and some tighter playing. The vocals are shit, I'll say it. I couldn't get any vocals I was happy with, so I ended up laying down some vocals while drunk. Not a good idea. The high note where I'm saying "storm king" is at the very top of my vocal range and you can hear me straining to hit it. Ugh, I'm not enjoying listening to it. I'm looking forward to completely redoing the vocals (more sober this time, and after lots of practice). Also the vocals are too loud in the mix by a dB or two, at least on my shitty speakers. I do like the guitar solo, and I think it goes well with the song. Also I think it might need to be a few BPM faster. It kinda drags on, although that might just be because I can't stand listening to the shitty vocals and I want it over. Musically a success, vocally a failure.

SLK - Holy detuned guitars batman. The drums sound a tiny bit high in the mix, and the guitars have a bit of a muddy, unclear sound. I think the vocals could really sound awesome with some EQ on them. Granted I'm a stickler for clean production, but I think the raw production takes away slightly from this song. A bit of brightening and tightening would do a lot. If I remember correctly you tune down to G or so... Which would put the low string of your bass guitar at like 28 hertz. That's really fucking low hahaha. What genre is this? I felt some of the fast kick drum notes felt out of place, and the song as a whole didn't have continuity or direction. I think it has good potential, but it just didn't seem to go anywhere to me.

Big_Grand - the intro threw me off. I wasn't expecting that. Nice sounding. I can definitely hear how this connects to sleeping. This would be a nice song to put on quietly in the background while doing something like reading. Very soothing and I'm really digging it. I felt the little fade in/fade out at the very end was a little unnecessary though. Also your playing there was very staccato and while I get what you were shooting for with that, I don't think it went well with the song. I say chop off that little bit at the end and you've got yourself a winner.

Dystopia4 - that's some badass graffiti. Not sure what the song's doing though. The guitars and bass almost don't seem in time with the drums, and I'm only hearing the drums on my left speaker and very quietly. The guitar solo doesn't sound in time or in tune with the rest of the song. I can hear you've got some good riffs in there but the recording sounds very thrown together and, well, sloppy. With decent recording I think this could be good but it's hard to tell what's going on with this recording.

PinePHresh and friend - the lyrics made me laugh a good bit. Funny stuff. The drums are very thin and the guitars are too boomy. Definitely work on mic techniques and EQing stuff properly and you could really improve the overall sound. Overall a pretty decent song, just needs less raw recording so we can hear what's going on.

Not bad overall. Always interesting to see how different all of our music is. Can't wait for the next one.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

I think if you listened to more funeral doom it would click more for ya. I don't really consider yzordderrex to be funeral doom but it's close to that. It's close to Khanate or doomier Ehnahre somewhat to Disembowelment. Which both are considered drone doom/ experimental death doom but I've always claimed to be 'ritualistic doom'. With that in mind clean production would be fucking terrible for it, but truthfully I don't hear any mud in the guitars at all. that's just natural tone unfiltered un-EQed to preserve the more natural state of it. The mud might steam more from the bass rumbling. I do agree the drums are too upfront for how I normally mix it but to me it doesn't destroy it totally. If I was going to remix it i'd do so with the drums not as upfront, making it even more 'earthy' sounding.

I do tune to G standard. The thought process behind the songs are the reign of an old tree how it twists and turns as the ages go on and eventually withers and dies. I wanted the music to ebb and flow with that, I hate standard verse chorus song structure so I go out of my way to neglect that. And after listening to both songs I wanted one to have a yearning and feeling of emptiness upon completion but that's slightly a goal I go for with every yzord release. Frowns forever, no uplifting ever.

I drum to how I feel the song needs to be propelled so even if it's doom metal but I feel a section is better represented with rapid double bass or even blast beats I include them regardless of the typical normal constraints of the genre.

But thanks for review, I hope this didn't come across as anything but more of an education of why I did certain things.

Oh no problem, and I know I'm kind of a production snob (haha) so I'll always have problems with production quality, especially my own. And I don't really listen to any doom, so it's a very new genre to me. I can totally understand wanting to get away from the verse chorus verse structure though. One of the reasons I've been branching out and trying some non-metal genres is to try totally new song structures. It did have a very dark, empty kind of mood to it, so now that I know that it makes more sense and is more of a success. Thanks for the explanations.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

Guitartheist: I'm not going to review my own song, but I do agree that the strings could've sounded better and that I used too much Master compression. I used Miroslav Philharmonik, which is a great VST, but I used pizzicato+tremolo strings combinations instead of string sections playing ordinary notes. A compositional mistake in this case.

infinitenexus: Killtacular riffs and fitting, though simple, drums. Clean production, good guitar solo. You are self-aware regarding your vocals, but I'm glad you submitted your song. I feel like you could've gotten away with layering your clean vocals with your screamed vocals instead of harmonizing at the edge of your range. I enjoyed this one.

ShaolinLambKiller: Absolutely crushing, great job expressing hopelessness. Drums are a bit loud but otherwise the production fits the songs. I enjoyed the tempo changes and overall organic nature of your release. I enjoyed these as well.

Big_Grand: Awesome composition, awesome emotion until 2:50. The weird fades don't work for me, and it sounds like some of your tracks are clipping. Otherwise, this is a brilliant soundscape.

Dystopia4: Everything sounds out of time and out of tune. If that's intentional, you nailed it. I feel like your song fits your picture, but I can't say I comprehend this style of music. It also sounds like you used a straight drum loop instead of programming a song's worth of drums. Drum variation would instantly improve this.

PinePHresh: Guitar/bass playing is quite tight, but again, drum variation is important. It's understandable that few people are able to record live drums, but in most cases it's silly to have any instrument playing the same thing without any changes for the duration of a composition.

I've decided to eschew verse-chorus structure for the next songwriting challenge. I have, however, greatly enjoyed writing verse-chorus songs. They're easy to write and people tend to enjoy them.

Bullet: Really strong death/doom. Great synthetic strings, excellent production, solid riffing. Love the breakdowns. The shredding is dope! This sounds massive. Dig the growls, not so keen on the clean vox. Not that it's bad, just don't dig the style. Definitely a standout on the comp, this is really well done and doesn't feels like something that would be on a solid release.

Storm King: Some good epic doom. Vocals tread the line between semi-operatic stuff and grungy alternative stuff (I don't mean anything bad by that, I swear). Another stronger one. Some great solos. The chorus is catchy as is the riffs.

Scapes of Slumber: Wonderful post-rock ambient driven stuff. Goes well with the picture. Feels like everything is at ease with the world. Pleasant stuff to drift off to, minimalistic and doesn't wear out it's welcome. I like how it comes creeping back at the end. Wonderful stuff, for sure.

Satan Invented the Chair - super lo-fi stuff. Basic soft blasting in the distance, it's all very minimalistic and in the background. I love the stumbling synthetic strings, but everything else was just alright.

New Dawn Fading - Alright, still not there yet, but clearly better than my last submission. It was meant to be sloppy to some degree, but probably not the amount it was. The recording wasn't so much "thrown together", I'm just really fucking inexperienced. My first time vocals, basically just shouted really loud, not entirely happy with them, but whatever could have been worse I suppose. I am happy with my lyrics, though. I think I came up with some decent riffs, just need better recording. And for the drums, yeah it's just a few loops, and yeah I have no fucking clue when it comes to drum programming. If I had more money I'd buy mics for my drum set so I could put some real drums on. I think this shows improvement but I know I still have a lot to work on. In my defense, this is my second time recording a real song.

My computer is having trouble streaming SLK's songs so I'll edit the review in later.

As I've been in the reviewing mood lately, I'll throw in my two cents on this.

guitartheist - Bullet

Having been in the art business for a few years, I think you could've probably sold this photo to people if it was slightly less grainy and had the can centered in the shot. The song wasn't exactly my cup of tea. The guitar tone sounds really nice, but the drums are a little too modern/electronic sounding for me. The clean vocals are sort of interesting, and I can imagine people really liking this. Some riffs were pretty neat.

Big_Grand - Scapes of Slumber

Very artsy photo. I actually quite like this track, but I think I actually would've liked it a bit more if the guitar was even lower-key. As it is, it's just a little too busy for the otherwise dreamlike music. The production on this song is really nice, though, both the guitar and the synth patches. I get what you're trying to do with that out-of-tune bend part right in the middle, but again I think that would've worked better if that moment was dragged out a bit longer. I'd actually like to try slowing this thing down to quarter speed to see what happens, haha. Kind of strange how the synth cuts out and the guitar continues at the end.

PinePHresh - Satan Invented the Chair

Hmm, I dunno about this one, man. This kind of sounds like bedroom black metal band #58,564,364. That main evil riff that repeats that's louder than everything else is pretty cool, but I don't know if it's enough to carry the whole song. The drum machine is quite bad and the production isn't strong enough for me to say much about the guitar or vocals other than that loud riff. I didn't see a photo, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess it's of a chair?

infinitenexus - Storm King

Storm King is a real tasty beer, that's for sure. I'm having a hard time making a connection between the stock-photo-ish image of a cloudy sky and this aggressive track. I get the lyrical connection of course...maybe I'm missing the spirit of the challenge. Anyway. As usual, your riffs are pretty good and your production is commendable, though your drums sound a little weak on this track I think. I think your vocal lines are actually well-written, but you might wanna look for a, uh, more professional singer if you wind up recording more material like this. Cool solo.

dystopia4 - New Dawn Fading

Haha, man, I'm spoiled. In days of yore loads of stuff submitted to these challenges was as sloppy as this. Anyway, I'm sure you're aware of the playing mistakes, out of time issues and all the rest so I won't really bug you about those. Practice, practice, practice I guess. The song itself wasn't so bad, though I'm not so sure about that lead line around two minutes. It kind of ruins the momentum of the song. The drum part a little further in is interesting, though. Your vocals weren't really up my alley, either - I think they'd have been better harsher.

Where's SLK's stuff?

Anyway, thanks for making this easier for me to download, PinePHresh, and thanks to the participants for keeping up with the challenge and getting some stuff done. This was a neat challenge idea.

My stuff is here on bandcamp cause when I made it I just did wavs uploaded and put together the layout and then I had to start working on mixing and putting together two other releases so I kinda feel to the wayside in simply making some mp3s to upload and send on so here is where to listen and see the pic/s that inspired it

You are welcome infinitenexus, I planned on offering an explaination of why I did what I did for my songs I usually include that with my reviews, but like I said I can't manage to play them right now and I'm more than anxious to do so. esp since I'm kinda stuck here watching tv and painting infront of my laptop.

guitartheist, glad you enjoyed it! The upcoming full length I'm going to make sure the damn drums are more balanced to the mix.

Guitartheist - you said I feel like you could've gotten away with layering your clean vocals with your screamed vocals instead of harmonizing at the edge of your range.I couldn't agree more. That's how I plan on doing the vocals when I redo it. The high pitched part (storm kiiiiiiing) will be a more thrash metal style yell, definitely gritty. I just wasn't able to do it here, since I'm in military quarters that are little better than a hotel room and I don't feel like people pounding on my door telling me to shut up. But that's exactly how I plan on doing it. Lots more grit, those vocals need. Also thought I'd mention, after hearing your track I went to your bandcamp and bought your album. Really good stuff; you're young and have a lot of talent and very tight playing. Keep that up and push your songwriting skills and you're going to have some seriously awesome songs out. No brown nosing intended.

iamntbatman - storm king is an awesome beer! I downed three before I realized it was 10.1% alchohol, and I actually wrote most of this song after drinking a 6 pack of them! That's where the name came from. I agree totally with the picture, I got the idea basically after all the storms were done here so I had to make do. I wish I could have gotten a picture of one of the bad storms - I was driving with a friend and lightning literally struck on the left, right, and in front of us at the same time and knocked out all radio stations for 10 minutes. It was an epic storm. The drums are a new program I'm using and the cymbals are not the best, so I totally agree with you on the weaker drum sound. It's a free program that I'm experimenting with, basically just to get a new sound (I usually use EZDrummer). Thank you for the compliment on my production, that's something I work very very hard on (even on my shitty laptop, which is all I have now). Thank you also for the compliment on the solo. I felt proud of that one, I'm not a shredder at all, just a rhythm player, but I think it really fit the song. And I agree 100%, I'm going to try to redo the vocals properly when I get back to my studio but if I can't I'll probably just try to find someone with a better voice. I don't have the best voice for that kind of singing at all, even with many lessons (and a bottle of wine). Hopefully with a lot of work and practice I can get something good, but we'll see.

SLK, always always glad to hear explanations on new techniques and insights from a fellow metal musician. Especially from the only person I've ever known that writes more music than I do (I write a metric shit ton but don't post a lot on here, but you still outdo me by a notable amount). I have a lot of respect for your ability to not only write riffs and whatnot, but to actually finish songs, and in that amount. I don't think everyone realizes that it's pretty hard at times to write AND finish complete songs at that pace and frequency.

sibraa6 - thank you so much! I really like that song and I think it has a lot of potential to be one of my better ones, I just have to get the vocals done right, as the song deserves. I promise all of you who enjoyed it that as soon as I get back home to my studio (in about 3-3.5 weeks) I will be redoing the vocals as they should be, with a lot more grit. Also sibraa, if you liked that song, I very very highly recommend you check out Grand Magus' album "Wolf's Return." It's an incredible stoner/doom album that I drew a ton of inspiration from. Plus their singer is my clean singing hero. Janne is fucking incredible.

I was self conscious about my shitty vocals literally to the point that it interrupted my concentration at work today, but you guys' comments really made me feel better. I know it's far from my best performance but I can promise all of you (not to sound cheesy or anything) that as soon as I get back home to my studio I will work hard to get the vocals right and immediately post it on here. Thank you all so much, these challenges are always such a great learning experience.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

Why thank you for that, even though we differ in our approaches and styles, I feel we are very much alike in the aspects which you described. I've been enjoying discussing back and forth the different merits and just ideas in general on creating and polishing that music. Even though I probably come off more of a prick. And thanks for noting the volume of work I put out and not just for the sake of volume either. cause I know a few people and friends told me we'll it's quality that counts not quantity... which I honestly feel everything I've done is quality, I just happen to be able to put it together quicker than most.

One of these days I'm going to post all of the shit I write on here. Even the non metal, and I've even written dubstep(!) though from a metal perspective. I definitely know how hard it is to write shit by yourself and complete it in a timely manner when you're the only person writing. It takes a lot of time and a lot of music talent. And we may have different approaches to our music but I think we have a similar mission, so to speak: To get our musical thoughts out there as much as possible, and to write as much as possible, no matter what. No matter what genre. Just write metal and get that shit out there. We should write something together sometime perhaps. Doom maybe. We might have to make a compromise on tuning though hahahahaha.

You can hear how some may possibly sound good on their own, but just don't stand out in a mix. A waste of 2 grand for some of them! There's a couple amps in there over 3 grand and you can hear how they would sound great jamming in your bedroom, but they simply cannot punch through a mix. Others are the opposite. I think that's where the greatness of the 5150 amp comes in, it sounds great and it still stands out in a mix.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

And honestly I still stand by Bugera. They've basically taken time-tested amps, improved on them slightly, and made them at a lower price. The earlier ones sucked and had reliability problems, but the newer ones have dealt with that now. I've owned two 6262 and I will stand by that amp. It fucking crushes, head-splitting amounts of gain, more volume than anyone needs, and a killer tone. And my second one I got off eBay for $300 with free shipping! Hey, if nothing else the Chinese are good at copying shit and doing it for cheap! (although I would rather support an American company, to be honest).

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

Guitartheist - you said I feel like you could've gotten away with layering your clean vocals with your screamed vocals instead of harmonizing at the edge of your range.I couldn't agree more. That's how I plan on doing the vocals when I redo it. The high pitched part (storm kiiiiiiing) will be a more thrash metal style yell, definitely gritty. I just wasn't able to do it here, since I'm in military quarters that are little better than a hotel room and I don't feel like people pounding on my door telling me to shut up. But that's exactly how I plan on doing it. Lots more grit, those vocals need. Also thought I'd mention, after hearing your track I went to your bandcamp and bought your album. Really good stuff; you're young and have a lot of talent and very tight playing. Keep that up and push your songwriting skills and you're going to have some seriously awesome songs out. No brown nosing intended.

I was self conscious about my shitty vocals literally to the point that it interrupted my concentration at work today, but you guys' comments really made me feel better. I know it's far from my best performance but I can promise all of you (not to sound cheesy or anything) that as soon as I get back home to my studio I will work hard to get the vocals right and immediately post it on here. Thank you all so much, these challenges are always such a great learning experience.

I'm psyched to hear your song with the vocals you've described. Also, thanks for checking out my album! I'm glad someone's enjoying it, I'm pretty awful at promoting (the most I've done is put a link in my signature and post an occasional thread in the Promo Forum). I sent you an email but it may've been spamfiltered.

To both SLK and nexus: It's awesome to participate in challenges with you guys. You are both about as prolific as I am with serious releases, and although your production styles differ from mine you are both very knowledgeable and give useful advice. I'm looking forward to SLK hearing everyone's songs.

infinitenexus wrote:

One of these days I'm going to post all of the shit I write on here. Even the non metal, and I've even written dubstep(!) though from a metal perspective.

Go for it! Personally I like the idea of a generalized bandcamp page linking to various projects - I have twelve albums on mine, and they span several genres.

My only problem with releasing all of my stuff is I want it to be kinda specifically categorized, although with bandcamp I guess that doesn't matter too much. Instead of a song or two in a genre I prefer to release an entire EP or album in a specific genre. Honestly I think I just take my music too seriously sometimes. About the only genre of metal I haven't written in is power metal, simply because I don't have the voice and I'm not a shredder, but one day I'll probably try. Music, especially metal, is more liberal, more rebellious than that though. Heavy metal, in a sense, originated from rebellion. I should just gather a couple songs and post that shit on bandcamp and not take it so seriously, oh this must be melodeath or death or I can't post it to Only a Shadow Remains. Fuck that. When I get back home I'm going to find another black metal artist and do a black metal split, and work on throwing all of my other shit out there. Who cares what anyone else thinks. Only a Shadow Remains is my emotional release via music, that's why I've written political songs, songs about my divorce, songs about my friends dying in war, etc. Who gives a shit what the genre is.

Although at the same time I think I have written some pretty interested mixes of dubstep/that style music and heavy metal. It's fun, take a random genre and inject metal guitars into it.

And don't worry about promoting dude, I'm the worst at promoting. I have a facebook page and I post in my sig here and like one other website (that I never post on). One day I may pay a guy a few bucks to promote my stuff but I just don't like doing that, I feel like I'm spamming everyone and it's annoying. Your music is good though, you have a good solid musical base and very tight playing. Like I said, expand your music writing abilities, challenge yourself, find your niche, and you're going to have some real winners. Already you've got some great music.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

So I must admit that my song was three tracks, but none where on top of each other. it was pretty much one guitar playing at a time with a bunch of ambient vst's to expand on the feel, so I can't take any credit for mixing because I'm still not great at putting two tracks together and balance them right. I want to redo this entire song in the future with my bass and a rhythm guitar track doing the lower notes, then a more crunchy overdriven guitar track for those higher notes so it dosent have that staccato sound the whole time.

sibraa6 - thank you so much! I really like that song and I think it has a lot of potential to be one of my better ones, I just have to get the vocals done right, as the song deserves. I promise all of you who enjoyed it that as soon as I get back home to my studio (in about 3-3.5 weeks) I will be redoing the vocals as they should be, with a lot more grit. Also sibraa, if you liked that song, I very very highly recommend you check out Grand Magus' album "Wolf's Return." It's an incredible stoner/doom album that I drew a ton of inspiration from. Plus their singer is my clean singing hero. Janne is fucking incredible.

I think the vocals may be my favorite part.

I got a Grand Magus CD in Metal Hammer or some metal magazine, I enjoyed it but haven't listened to much more

Big_Grand, do you mean all those instruments at the same time, playing the same song you posted? I thought the song you submitted was excellent, I just felt the staccato playing in the end didn't really fit. If you want to add some more, maybe add a bass playing some root notes underneath the main clean guitar - maybe just coming in halfway through, to create a sort of movement. And if you add a distorted guitar make sure it's not too loud. The focus of that song is the melody played by the clean guitar and you don't want to drown that in any way. So if you add a dirty guitar, maybe keep it kinda quiet and playing some chords that follow the note progression of your clean guitar. Kind of in the same line as the bass - to support the melody and enhance it. But even as you submitted it, I thought it was great.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

I got a Grand Magus CD in Metal Hammer or some metal magazine, I enjoyed it but haven't listened to much more

Seriously, check out Wolf's Return. I would say it's their best album, and that guy's vocals are absolutely incredible. That entire album is incredible in fact, an excellent blend of stoner metal with some doom. I would give it 5/5.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

I feel the same way about promotion that I feel that I'm spamming if I post about the same thing over and over again. So usually I do so once and that's about it. I actually really miss old myspace cause it was easier for me there, like when I was doing Filtheater on there, I would go and friend like 500 people in an evening and even if 50 of those check it out a few of them would go on and buy shit and talk to me about it. Hell even some larger bands I was able to trade with like Funeral Whore and Bonesaw. Hell Bonesaw wanted to do shows if they came to the states around nola area.

I'm always glad to do these challenges to not only showcase my work, but to see and maybe learn/take away something from each track from each submitter. And it's quite enjoyable to hear these songs that were created in a relatively short time giving a insight on how each person approaches and creates something.

Bullet - Guitartheist, I think the synth cellos are neat though them made me think shit was skipping. I think the clean vocals are very strong and I usually hate cleans they work here. I really think the death vocals are very strong. though the drums are fake, I think they sit rather nicely in the mix with the guitars, they work since the guitars are pretty clean tone wise and that clarity is punctuated nicely. after the 1:30 mark.. kinda felt it sounded a lot like a Lamb of God of song... didn't immediately hate it but that's what I immediately thought of. I like the lead later in sounds really nice and tasteful, right amount of feel and shred. it's a good track. overall it kinda reminds me of like mid era Nevermore. if you did more like that shit I'd be willing to listen, maybe even buy an album.

Storm King - infinitenexus I like the meaty riffs, sounds like it's kinda supposed to be a more chuggy Manilla Road to a degree. I actually don't think your vocals horrible like you thought, but just a need of more refinement. Yea it's far more traditional than what i was thinking it was supposed to be since you kept saying stoner/doom. I was thinking something like Kyuss. That lead is pretty bitching. I really should at one point try to go back and learn how to properly solo in a more classic sense instead of noise bursts. Seemed to go on a bit longer than I thought it should. Tone sounded pretty nice, cleaner than what I like and everything sounded nicely mixed. Really have nothing to rip on that, just sounded good.

Scapes of Slumber - Big_Grand Interesting idea and picture you chose to write about. and honestly with the pic and how this starts up I swear I'm listening to a Pianos Become the Teeth track. and I really wish it was, I was expecting some really emotionally skramz to come pouring out. Since I know that's not happening I do like the overall sound and mix of everything. Everything sounds very nicely mixed, nothing really overbearing or ruining the song. to a degree sounds like a buildup for an Across Tundras song as well and taking why you wrote what you did would be rather fitting. nice that false ending there... didn't expect that. I was about to turn the bastard off and go to the next one..

New Dawn Fading - Dystopia4 Well I can hear everything... rather raw and the vocals are really loud in the mix. This actually reminds me of the punk bands that would come through down here and were stoned/drunk out of their minds and were getting to heady for their own good. Like they were writing epics yet don't remember how to play them. This is just an really odd sounding piece be it on purpose or on accident. I almost feel like I'm listening to a couple of bands jamming in separate rooms and I'm standing between them. So it's not quite awful, it kinda works in that way of... well this is neat cause I want to hear what's next and how it sorta works or how it's making my brain work to make some sense of the entire thing. Reallly I can smell the stale beer and cigarettes already while listening to this. Does have that jam like quality of just what the hell, smash everything together and pray for the best..

Satan Invented the Chair- interesting sound on the guitar.. sounds sorta accoustic but with one of those pickups you kinda plug into it. very bedroom sounding but I guess that's to be expected with short notice and all. I wouldn't mind hearing it as a full song, as is kinda sounds like a demo for a song.

Bullet - Guitartheist, I think the synth cellos are neat though them made me think shit was skipping. I think the clean vocals are very strong and I usually hate cleans they work here. I really think the death vocals are very strong. though the drums are fake, I think they sit rather nicely in the mix with the guitars, they work since the guitars are pretty clean tone wise and that clarity is punctuated nicely. after the 1:30 mark.. kinda felt it sounded a lot like a Lamb of God of song... didn't immediately hate it but that's what I immediately thought of. I like the lead later in sounds really nice and tasteful, right amount of feel and shred. it's a good track. overall it kinda reminds me of like mid era Nevermore. if you did more like that shit I'd be willing to listen, maybe even buy an album.

Thanks man! Jeff Loomis is a huge influence of mine, and I am working on some more brutal (as opposed to squeeky clean) production/shred oriented stuff right now.

Yeah, one of these days I do need to learn how to properly solo. When I began learning guitar I basically learned some kirk hammett solos, the e Phrygian mode, and nothing else in terms of lead work. I just learned songs and played them. I really should learn, I'm just lazy haha.

_________________Music For The Dead Death, doom, black, grind, and more. New albums out from Eternal Oblivion and Devourer in the Mist.

I come from the Kerry King style of soloing. Just twiddle your fucking fingers on the high strings and trill pick and pray something usable comes out. Oh and a bunch of tapping. I love to use that in my solos as well.